micro social safety net helps taking risks. see also what happens to your brain when living in poverty day to day. // And this is a key advantage: When basic needs are met, it’s easier to be creative; when you know you have a safety net, you are more willing to take risks. “Many other researchers have replicated the finding that entrepreneurship is more about cash than dash,” University of Warwick professor Andrew Oswald tells Quartz. “Genes probably matter, as in most things in life, but not much.” [...] “If one does not have money in the form of a family with money, the chances of becoming an entrepreneur drop quite a bit,” Levine tells Quartz.

[ growing for growth sake! vs growing in a world/area that is not conducive to grow ] When Twitter went public in 2013, its stock soared and its value jumped to $25 billion. Its founders and early investors got rich. But since then, the company has been considered a failure, despite the fact that it boasts 320 million active users, because it's not growing fast enough. Douglas Rushkoff, author of "Throwing Rocks at the Google Bus: How Growth Became the Enemy of Prosperity," talks to Steve Paikin about why he sees the push for more growth as dangerous. // true capitalists (shareholder, crony, greedy) w/o self-regulation or governance extract all the value there is to extract and then leave, dispersing it to the few who already have [...] WE MUST REWRITE THE RULES OF THE GROWTH GAME ITSELF! [...] you want to optimise the economy based on velocity of money (circulation of money), not share price and value extraction [...]

37:00 - people go to amazon. pipe of stuff // same w Netflix - pipe of entertainment / front door of entertainment // cost free, marginally no cost to expand // key is now discovery! // but suppliers have no choice. cost pressure. // aggregation theory // differentiation only from being irreplaceable. unique. focused. narrow. avoid go out of way of commoditization. price is dead. newspaper itself has been fractured, broken up. // amazon is default for consumers. // how would you build a business that fit into amazon? that still makes you successful? differentiate to the point where you get a direct connection to the consumer! << custom to order quote paintings and other!? Want to compete in a completely new arena! where things are not scalable. where people can't compete on price with you. no "low-end focus" // winner take all effects - monopsony - size leverage to command conditions. // 1:12:00 find a niche

Just how punishing that price was became clear in late September. In an investor document about the sale that was distributed to shareholders, employees discovered their Good stock was valued at 44 cents a share, down from $4.32 a year earlier. In contrast, preferred stock owned by Good’s venture capitalists was worth almost seven times as much, more than $3 a share. The paperwork also showed that Good’s board had turned down an $825 million cash offer just six months earlier, in March. // via https://redd.it/3yehai

“I direct my work not towards what I’m best at, but where there’s impact,” Thrun said. “If you can build a self-driving car, that’s great. But if you can teach people to build a self-driving car, that’s even better.” // along the lines of great minds with small ideas (yet another consumer-entertainment-escapism product).

Too much in Silicon Valley revolves around hyperspeed. Everything in the startup world is an emergency that needs to be solved in an all-nighter last night, if you allow it to be. The genius in Ravikant’s AngelList is its measured, methodical, brick-by-brick pace to build a software platform to replace, save, wreck, or augment – the verb depends on your point of view – a business that everyone insisted for decades was incurably human, boutique and done with deeply-trusted partnerships and eye-to-eye handshake deals. //&! bit.ly/1LS4aVg - The “The old Series A investor who put in $2 million and really cared and had resources is dead.” [...] “A seed fund doesn’t have the resources that a Kleiner Perkins or a Benchmark had,” [ Incubators are only 3 months long ] AngelList syndicate leads help, but they don’t care enough to help [as classic VC's] [...] Entrepreneurs have to stitch it together themselves.”

[ your edgy and PR storm/press differentiation can become a liability to future growth especially if you use that kind of marketing to grow, clickbait is not sustainable. stupid. should have stayed private and nimble! wall street and the numbers call it a bluff of the founder, cant be bigger & more than it was pre-ipo. no growing endlessly as edgy brand ] American Apparel has faced growing competition in the US from cut-price overseas competitors such as H&M, who have effectively replicated the brand’s fashion for a lower price. [...] recorded a loss for ten consecutive quarters, which was unsustainable given its debts. [...] American Apparel is the country’s biggest manufacturer of clothing and it is based in downtown Los Angeles. The company claims to pay experienced factory works more than $30,000 a year, compared with $600 a year for workers in Bangladesh factories. [...] we are taking this step to keep jobs in the US, and preserve the ideals for which the company stands.”

[capital efficiency?] // the other 1/4th is bidding up via credit bubble riches, diversification. other 2/4ths from planning restriction and natural biz cycle of sv //&! http://www.thebolditalic.com/articles/7266-an-open-letter-to-anyone-moving-to-san-francisco-for-a-tech-job - For context, people are right to be angry; shit is certainly fucked up. Since 2010, rents have risen by 40%, and eviction rates have risen by 38%—two rapid changes that have had very visual consequences all across the city. Much of SoMa, for instance, looks like an elephant graveyard. Sidewalks look like the surface of the moon; alleys are littered with broken glass; and streets are strewn with sleeping persons and human shit. All of this can be observed from in the shade of the brand-new office buildings and luxury condos that now line the streets everywhere east of 4th Street. [...] those who move to San Francisco and don’t engage with the community dilute and adulterate San Francisco’s sense of character.

Psychologist Iris Mauss at the University of California, Berkley found that the pursuit of happiness might just leave you worse off. “Wanting to be happy can make you less happy,” said Mauss in an interview with livescience.com. “If you explicitly and purposely focus on happiness, that appears to have a self-defeating quality.” [...] In her studies, participants who were not happy would begin blaming themselves for feeling sad. They thought it was an immediate flag for their failure, making these negative feelings even more counter-productive. The people who accepted these negative feelings as normal, however, were much happier in the long run. So, accepting your sadness could actually make you feel good. [...] For Darwin, emotions were very much tied to surviving, which requires more than just happiness. [...] Be open about how you’re feeling, don’t try to hide behind it or conceal it. // &! keeping a diary talking to and about yourself compassionately.

Malala Yousafzai & Kylie Jenner. Both turned 18 recently. One was given a Ferrari and spent thousands on facial modification. The other was awarded a Nobel Peace Prize, survived a gun shot to the face by the Taliban due to corruption in her country, and opened a school for Syrian refugees to combat the lack of education for youth around the world. What's upsetting is the media is only covering one of these stories as "breaking news." Share the post to spread real love and inspiration across the youth of the world. Last thing to note, Malala is infinitely more beautiful! **re-posted // hard things are hard for a reason! // what happens to the cognitive surplus what everyone talked about at the turn of the century? its being eaten by consumption pattern - on the mobile homescreen (Entertainment, utility, Gaming, Escapeism, snacking).

But I think our industry culture is moving far faster than the writers at Silicon Valley might wish to believe. I think we’re seeing the rise of a new culture, one that rejects arrogance and the founder worship which breeds it. Inevitable outliers aside, the Valley and technology culture I experience every day in my work at NewCo is one of passion, sweat, earnestness, and good intentions. Sure, we all fuck up. And sure, the press (especially, not surprisingly, the press in New York) has a field day when someone does. But by and large, the teams making companies like Slack, LiveRamp, Medium, Earnest, MetroMile, Lyft, Okta, Pinterest, and hundreds more are damn fine people, and they are dedicating their lives to making something that creates positive change – a product or service that makes the world a better place (even if it’s in a small way). [...] When you’re facing existential threat, our tolerance for douchebaggery in the name of making more money at any cost, ....

[ always along the motto: extension of you, part of you. The new Apple under Jobs was NOT an overnight success! It build on its differentiation, strong base, a cult, a Tribe, 1000 True Fans, and build on it stride by stride. Most capitalistic company out of SV, no counter-culture out of largest corp on world. & can pull of iAd coup because it has monopsony! & Duopoly w Android. ] Many people love Apple, others despise it. But, even without Jobs, it cannot be ignored. There simply is no other company that combines such a high-quality hardware line with such well-regarded software platforms. A faltering Samsung has the former, but not the latter. A strong and admirable Google has the latter, but not the former. If you didn’t believe that before, this week’s event made it crystal clear, with once-bitter rivals like Microsoft and Adobe showing up onstage to boast about how well their products worked with new Apple hardware and software. [ sw & hw iteration = leverage comp advantage ]

"Hype is a drug. As the entepreneur you can't resist it. But as the entrepreneur it'll bite you in the ass every time. So if you choose to build your company on hype, you're going to have to live with the consequences." // & cheerleading squadron that sits inside the bubble & transmits signals 2 the outside world is not helping these companies 2 dampen down 'just reporting'. There are rarely if, buts, question marks, demand for numbers, critical journalism, viability and sustainability questions, ... there is no journalism. and forget investigative journalism that could break another Techopus. Its also fuelled by the way established companies handle their PR. treat journalists. off the record practise, invites, dont tell anybody else, u didnt hear that from me, here is the invite 4 that special even for special people, ego stroking techniques. feeding ground for insular environment. //&! Fancy office (phony display of success) w A Round money 4 no revenue plan product &JUST BUY GROWTH!

>> bit.ly/15SfOfU &! bit.ly/1M6Khcb &! bit.ly/1uxEz6s (( Discover wants to be Newsfeed ala Facebook without 'Liking' a page (BEING FED ... uhhhh, so TV/Radio/Newspaper. You don't discover, you are being fed.), but curated, and first foray into introducing ads (figuring out a business model) ... and not opting to go/experiment w native ads (Snaps pushed to users, ala Superbowl ads! at around half the price point of Superbowl ads? Why not. With a tight grip on quality, storytelling, authenticity, ... sure can't scale it very much. And not the ultimate money machine at first.) )) --- vs --- Gary Vaynerchuks opinion on it - bit.ly/1zBUCYm &! bit.ly/1XSVS2L - argues if programming is good (content being the variable) people will go there repeatedly vs their website or own app. // BUT is Discover too far removed from Snapchat being Snapchat (medium is the message) itself and thus friction. Bc of no empowerment, engagement, experience the original medium has! Stapled on non-native feature.

Valuing common stock has gotten trickier for startups. The growing number and complexity of rights on preferred shares are causing companies to adjust their reasoning around how much their common stock is worth, according to firms providing the valuations and lawyers overseeing them. But companies still have a lot of discretion, a reminder that how startups calculate their value frequently bears little relation to big funding headlines. [...] Valuations of startup firms’ common stock for employee option grants has been complicated by increasing complexity of rights on preferred stock and secondary market transactions. [...] [ !!! Snapchat offered common stock only in recent (May 2015) investment, Alibaba & two hedge funds were ok with it. But further termsheet details (liquidation preferences) unknown. Existing holders of common stock (employees) could be diluted massively, in future, ie Snapchat has a down round in the future/eventual IPO - on.wsj.com/1KICv8H &! bit.ly/1iiJw3G ]

Our immigration system hinders entrepreneurship, innovation and productivity. Success in the tech industry, where whole new job categories are created overnight, requires deep familiarity with trends, products and technologies. Learning opportunities abound — if you’re willing to transition to new roles, educate yourself, work on different products or switch companies altogether. Building your own startup, or even joining one, can be the best career move; it offers remarkable potential for growth by wearing multiple hats in an expanding organization. The labor market benefits from this flexibility not just with an improved and adaptable workforce, but also one that creates jobs. The immigration process impedes all these possibilities. [...] [ reset process when switching companies ] [...] And that’s not even the worst part. If you get laid off, you must leave the country. Immediately. [...] Try telling your VC you spent $25,000 of their $1 million funding on immigration fees

In The New World, FTEs (Full-Time Employees) Will Become APIs. Much has been made about how the dropping cost of website infrastructure has spurred a boom in startup formation, with Amazon Web Services held up as the prime example. The capital cost of servers has been eliminated, but even more important is the plummeting human cost. (<< Netflix has no own data center) [...] Companies and products like Heroku, Celery, RabbitMQ, Mandrill, Fastly, Chartio, Chargebee, Shipwire, Docker, Codeship, Rainforest QA, Replicated and Chartbeat have changed the nature of tech development. [...] Sure, there is a shortage of talent today, but developers are rapidly finding ways to put future developers out of jobs.

Nothing we know [ about X ] should be assumed to be true. // Technology is the product of the culture that builds it. // If you want to build for the long term, the only guarantee is change. Invest in your people and your ability to ask questions, not your current answers. Your current answers are wrong, or they will be soon. // Software development should be thought of as a cycle of continual learning and improvement rather a progression from start to finish, or a search for correctness. If you aren’t shipping, you aren’t learning. If it slows down shipping, it probably isn’t worth it. Maturity is knowing when to make the trade off and when not to. // You build a culture of learning by optimizing globally not locally. Your improvement, over time, as a team, with shared tools, practices and beliefs is more important than individual pockets of brilliance. And more satisfying. [ anti-Rock Star dev philosophy ] [ book by Red Hat CEO Open Organization ]

After 15 years of staggering declines, the cost of building a company in San Francisco is rising sharply // prohibitive! diluting too much too early. // China and other BRIC paper millionaers divesting into property speculators, around the world. every city that has seen substantial price appreciation +10-20% over last +5 years // hot money from monetary policy, excess reserves, flushing around the globe //

German start-ups copy each other now ... It's not the Samwer Brothers anymore, they have already lots on their existing plate (made up of copycats). Add the credit bubble, public market distortions and free cash that is flushing around put into seed rounds, as enabler. #Facepalm // smart heads, small opportunist ideas, x for y locally here in z.

// I am an HR dictator. Don't be a dick like Steve because Steve was a dick and was successful and this icon that died a tragic death. << wantrepreneur. // its about having a product/market fit and executing well! it's what you do with it. //

craft a career path that suits ur interest. what are u getting excited abt every day. helps with learning, deep learning! the more passion. the more knee deep u are in. increases ability to learn. // go through apprenticeship, and tour of duty. its skills skills skills. 3, 4, 5, 6, ... live in hyper competitive world (globalisation) // information has to become accumulated, stored, put into action again and again (retrieval). // social intelligence, EQ, forging your own path, // let your work speak for itself, for you. // social intelligence // 10000 hours // you become the product of your education (environment). // Napoleon // we life in a complex world, master your complex field, ideas come to you. philosophers stone. // its about problem solving. its not sexy and glamorous // entrepreneurship is about character, worth more than an ivy league degree // go where you learn most, start-up // u dont want people 2 love u, u have no control over it, it is not needed. its abt skills.

Everyone should be doing something lefty. The internet was abt that. Now its everyone wants 2 be big. Optimised. Cool things come out of waste, wasting times, free time, ... eureka effect. Lefty things are not optimised. // "We build a fucking great bridge." Nobody did back then seismic modeling. They just build a fucking great bridge that actually can carry twice the lanes/traffic, you can just put a 2nd deck on it with another 6 lanes. << build 4 prosperity. not optimised. THUS lesson, build ur business that way, 4 prosperity, pay money if u want 2 used it. Dont optimise 4 anything specifically. // Oldest Companies are still family owned. Not pressures by Wall Street 4 growth & profit. "No one is happy being profitable." "You wind up taking risks, eventually falling on your face." #growth-fetish // Venture Capital wants an exit. U put urself in that corner & have fiduciary responsibility. // If u own category/vertical u can sort of set price! & 46 oh hi there world, own platform!!!

Encouraging colleagues to exercise can help remedy strains and stresses – but there’s a fine line between wellbeing and piling on more pressure to achieve [...] “It offers the team opportunities to mix outside the workplace, so the engineering team gets to hang out with the care team, for example, and this contributes significantly to morale. I would definitely recommend other businesses consider a similar initiative.” [ investment in your company and people! ] [...] [its] about balance and tailoring activities to the interests of your staff. Provided you get this right, you can improve productivity levels and staff attitudes towards your business – in a 2013 survey by Mind, 60% of workers said they’d feel more motivated if their employer took action to support their mental wellbeing. [ gov should give tax incentive (partial write off) 4 health & well being programs! as it saves on sick days & NHS! ] &! bit.ly/1fDTyuf

// cost of entry? // unable to make it happen? // Can't you write software from anywhere? // problem, heavily diluted early on approaching A/B, traditional shops don't like the cap table of pre-seed, angels, seed, accelerator & Micro VC's already owning ~+40% ... you come to a traditional A/B shop and not one of the existing investors is actually leading the round or committed in paper do double down? // // from a financial perspective/investment/math --- in the PRIVATE MARKET thrown under the bus by NIRP, QE, hunt for yield and FOMO (looking for their female unicorn or own Zuck) everyone can run 100 burger stands with unlimited/stellar returns in their spreadsheet model (bc cost of capital being 0 or negative). Despite the deflation of price of software & hosting (marginal cost, economics of abundance), Talent got bid up heavily (+200k/y in LA by Snapchat) in certain cities (SV, NY, London) // &! Steen Jakobsen - youtu.be/fnp5ETnKylU - min 16 avg guy does not have access to credit!

via bit.ly/1LGvMtb // RESEARCH SHOWS THAT THE BETTER OUR REASONS FOR WORKING, THE BETTER WE WORK. AND IT ISN'T JUST AMAZON THAT SHOULD TAKE NOTE. // >> 4-day work week hustle and busting ass, 3 day weekend!? - via ycombinator commenter - I think that I did better work always having 3 day weekends, and opened up time for other activities like writing books and getting more exercise. - see descape.de/about/ - // work has meaning, u have identity, and get time to recover and explore else, not just identify yourself w work. // see teamtreehouse ryan carson. // http://thehustle.co/why-millennials-are-unhappy

EVERY so often a management idea escapes from the pages of the Harvard Business Review and becomes part of the zeitgeist. In the 1990s it was “re-engineering”. Today it is “disruptive innovation” // innovators dilemma - blue ocean //

If SaaS Products Sell Themselves, Why Do We Need Sales? - bit.ly/1iEDXFR - The true purpose of sales is to create new value for customers. Especially for a startup or growth company that’s addressing a new market or trying to solve a complex problem. That’s why enterprise/SaaS sales requires a well-developed process and guidelines. [ << blog, communication, evangelists, referral codes, feedback, content marketing, building a Tribe/1000 True Fans one by one >> ] Our job was to go out there and show customers a different but better way of doing business. // The Price Is Right: And for Early-Stage SaaS Companies, It Needs to Be. - bit.ly/1N55FgU - //Understanding Your Customer's Desired Outcome.

>> always on record. thus being consistent, you, authentic, key to sustainability. everyone is the PR agent for themselves. // bullshit detectors have become hyper-refined. // - have to open yourself up to it, as requirement, to be radically honest, vulnerable, see Brene Brown. // also, have to leave money on the table! << going for the marathon! not the sprint. not profit maximisation. go for legacy. willingness to say no, knowing when to say no because it would be short-term optimisation. // keeping values/guiding principles/mission/vision with growing team - is about success of your leadership team/exec team (Eventbrite gal talked about this in yc talk, surprised about internal champions/leaders). // [AD PRODUCT FOR CLOSETPHILE AND OH HI THERE WORLD!] attention graph/span: what brings value to ppl?! ads should bring, have to bring value! its not about reach/pageviews. its about attention. being part. creating value!!! also not add friction - ie pre-roll ad. normal ads steal time!

We will learn: - Master your own fear of rejection and how to make it your advantage - Customer Service: How to Turn Rejections Into Opportunities - You Can Say 'NO' and Make Me a Fan -- what my 100 crazy requests taught me about great customer service - Sales and Life: Why Rejection Is Your Best Friend

what got u to here, will kill u as u grow larger & larger (the usual (anecdotally) start-up chaos/shit-show will suck the life out of growth/co potential later on, need 2 build foundation/base/pillars/structure in form of CFO/COO/board/HR & some kind of processes 2 follow. so ppl dont have/will reinvent the wheel again. when? u probably will know it when u see it, but still can ask seasoned people who have been through it &/or ask 4 connections though ur VC. // keep being frugal, where possible. Amazon is still being know 2 be frugal. Door desks are still alive in Seattle Offices. No perks like Google/FB. Amazon made always losses, still makes losses via e-commerce unit. Had 2 be frugal otherwise it would actually been dead long ago. // Keep things in place that help/enable 2 grow! customer obsession (inventing in the name of the customer), response, service, keep adding value/value creation. // PLAY 2 WIN! FIGURE IT OUT as u go along around ur values!

One of the most critical metrics for software companies — but also one of the most difficult to measure — is the lifetime value of their customers (LTV). The lifetime value dictates how a company should spend its marketing and sales dollars. Unfortunately, many early stage startups struggle to measure LTV, because they haven’t been around very long and, consequently, haven’t seen a large number of customers through their lifespans with the product. // &! http://techcrunch.com/2015/08/29/the-saas-success-database/

- hire so other people can solve problems, you don't have to do everything! when you wait too long, you get into a need, into a pressure situation you've created by waiting to hire people to help solve problems, do xyz. and bc of that you may compromise and hire because it would be great right now if that person would do it anyway, even if you have doubts about fit, character, values, ...

In sports marketing, no one ever got fired for hiring a cute blond female athlete. It is the default choice. This can be, let’s just say it, racist. It’s definitely lookist. But it’s mainly conservative. In advertising, in television, in movies, the tendency is to look backward. Hiring only people who fit past models of success may often not work, but it comes with fewer consequences when it fails than trying something new does. To get all Keynesian about it, “Worldly wisdom teaches that it is better for reputation to fail conventionally than to succeed unconventionally.” [ risking looking like a fool ... vs playing it safe. incrementalism a to b - vs - dreamer/imagination ---- Logic will get you from a to b. Imagination will take you anywhere. Albert Einstein. ---- first break all the rules (book) ---- thus take into account ppls background where they came from/come from. are they trying to play it safe? with their advise? ]

Failure. To most people it smells. People are afraid of it. It’s like cancer or divorce. When you have it you find you who your true friends are because they’re the ones who double down on helping, on being available, on listening, on understanding. Most people run from failure or disease because they’re hard to handle. Hard to know how to deal with. Awkward. But I am attracted to those who have had severe set-backs in life because it tells you something about the mettle of the person with whom you’re dealing. It reminds me of a famous quote in one of my favorite novel’s “Damage” by Josephine Hart “Damaged people are dangerous. They know they can survive.” [...] closed up shop at the very first hurdle. I wouldn’t work with him again. [...] Honor is what I’m looking for. How you failed is significantly more important than if you failed. [play the long-game = relationships, trust, network [ character, live life 4 ur eulogy, not CV, not bank account - nyr.kr/1J5Y13X & bit.ly/1KrTfPT ]

It’s best encapsulated in a famous Jeff Bezos quote, “You can work long, hard or smart, but at Amazon.com you can’t choose two out of three,” [...] Try working at Goldman Sachs, [...] You think it’s different at any of the top consulting firms? [...] You see organizations like these thrive on large pools of some of the country’s best and brightest graduates that trade off 2-5 years of work experience under extreme pressure in exchange for skills, experiences & relationships that will last a lifetime. [Accelerated Learning] [...] Think its a cake walk working @ any of the countries top law firms? [...] Should we do an article on what it’s like to be a medical resident? How abt working in the US military? Chief of Staff for a major political figure? What abt a top athlete in the NFL or NBA or even part of the coaching staff. Think they dont have work/life balance challenges in a field theyve chosen to work in? [#Top 100 of X vs avg white- or blue-collar worker ] [what u optimize for?]

'averting catastrophic events' - hard things about hard things - book // when taking on growth round to grow aggressively company (buying customer growth)... you might actually take on risk. especially when the sentiment and the market turns and you burned it all and weren't so good at allocating the money and 'growing' you have to maybe raise a flat/downround ... ooopsies. Or even have to accept a debt round and massive lay-off to get to cash flow even/positive. And run a tight ship with the user base/business you've got. // re: post-price correction after speculative China bubble burst and massive China weakness and still existing/persistent deflationary pressures in western world. // &! bit.ly/1NTc3GM - Public markets affect venture funding. Full stop.

15:53 - you can build sw companies everywhere else. cost of living out of control as well dampens quality of life and standard of living. // lower burn rate, more time, more runway to find traction (product market fit) beyond MVP,

At the beginning of your company when you are always a couple of months away from going out of business and every crisis is an existential crisis, because all you’re trying to do is optimize for staying alive. That is the happiest and simplest time in your company… everything else is in the good problem to have category, which is like “Good news, you’re kind of successful that’s why you’re having it. Bad news is it’s more stressful than anything else before.” &! As a founder your instinct is to put something new in the world... you start a company because you are irreverent. You start a company because you want to create something out of nowhere, and the paradox is that if you are successful with that, and then a job evolves from an act of creativity and irreverence. Focus and execution and scaling become equally important as [creativity and irreverence]. You have to ask yourself am I a fit for what the job requires?

I recently heard a story about one VC pushing a company to drive their burn up from $1 million a month to $2.5 million. Unfortunately, an inefficient sales force will always come back to bite you in the butt. We typically think of 60 percent as the benchmark for a healthy performing sales organization. Anything less and you don’t have a repeatable model. [ avc did write about that you need to find product/market fit, traction, self starter, great net promoting score, without spending marketing/advertising/pr ] [...] The goal of every entrepreneur and VC for that matter should be to build sustainable and scalable businesses. The only way to do that is to focus on the metrics that truly matter. The companies that nail many, if not all, of the above criteria will be the ones that make it to the finish line, and the balance will be wandering through the forest looking for someone to feed them.

meritocracy, democratic, egalitarian. anyone who has interest, can find it. u will have an audience, even it is just 1. either they like it, share it & come back. or they leave u alone. // Beme, remove the aspect of creation. the friction. the cognitive cost. the overhead. a process to follow. a tutorial or how to listicle to read. to Google or to ask. >> Product developers & investors should think about the cognitive cost of their products. The cognitive cost very often can be much higher than the financial cost. Products with a low cognitive cost are those where the technology fades away and dont require a consumers ongoing attention. bit.ly/1Nz0veO // "Don't make me think." << book, UI UX mantra. // Photo-filter-app vs photo-editing-app vs video-editing-ai-augmented-intelligence-app that have popped up. podcasting. EDM // what has lots of overhead & sometimes really disappointing user experience? Skype, Windows, FriendFeed, Twitter?(niche compared 2 FB). Q&A youtu.be/6xVdM0QJq6Y

[ SEC filings show it wanted to raise lots more money ] Think about the implications of this for a moment: we know the company wanted $2.75 million in June, and got most of it. But we also know that 35 days later, Zirtual had been looking for another $3 million, and only got $650,000. That is a meaningful shortfall, an 80% difference between the money they needed and the money they got. [...] In fact, you might have concluded they were in for some kind of serious financing and operational problem weeks in advance [ talked also in Jason's interview that they still have legacy customers who cost them too much but are sort of still keep on: book 'hard things about hard things'], when you connect the fairly clear dots between two attempts to raise capital within a month of each other, and which are increasingly unsuccessful. [...] We’re not talking about an equity financing here, we’re talking about debt. [...] debt is a harsh mistress, especially for a startup tech company.

Hello! This week, Farhad Manjoo (New York Times) and Jay Yarow (Business Insider) are joined by special guest Jodi Kantor (New York Times) to discuss her polarizing article about Amazon's culture. // // how technology functions in the workplace - efficiency, quantified self << the feedback tool you can always use, what ever your state of emotion, gripe, stick, bias, prejudice, ... feudal Darwinism creeps into knowledge worker, white-collar and blue-collar workers, MBA's and PhD's. [...] contributes to gender inequality (women with the back on their wall, leave or get started and forget about family & kids, life.) [...] brutal years are NOT Tour of Duty - Reid Hoffman The Alliance. // PS: Reed Hastings (Netflix) Culture document transpires that it is expected to contribute, even if it doesn't spell it out. Netflix also had to fight and overcome as much as Amazon! Proves again that internal & external environment a company finds itself affects its values & culture inevitable [Thesis].

"Retention was clearly bad, and that’s what killed us" [...] [...] This all comes back to stepping on the gas before finding product market fit. You might think you have product market fit and so you scale up your hiring, your marketing, your sales, and your capital raising and spending. But if you can’t retain a healthy percentage of your users past ninety days, you don’t have product market fit yet and all the investment you make in your business is just money down the drain. So focus first on your 90 day retention numbers and make sure to nail them and prove you have product market fit. Then scale. // find natural/organic marketing - advertising - instead of building a non-product related cost center like sales, marketing, and advertising. short-cuts like these don't fix the product per se.

I could tell within 5 minutes of meeting an investor whether they would invest. Investors who invested were excited about eShares before we met. They either saw the vision and liked it. [...] Excited investors (and the ones who invested) were different. They didn’t let me pitch. Instead, they asked questions to assess risk. They tried to find reasons not to invest. That is the pitch-paradox. The investors who won’tinvest will ask you why they should . The investors who will invest ask you why they shouldn’t. [ check you if you know your business/product/vertical/category inside out and intellectual honesty ] Your job is to make sure you don’t have reasons that they shouldn’t. Fundraising is simple: find investors that get excited about your company. It is a filtering exercise. Too many founders believe they have the wrong pitch instead of realizing they have the wrong audience. // [ from comments: The good VCs know what they want to invest in, and when they see you, they know it ... ]